Shocking hints

[yukonhorror]

This came up in discussion of how the interface of our game for HHGG should be.  Who agrees with me and who has the technology.

In some games, when your cursor is over an item you can interact with, a label pops up.  Either the name or an exclamation point or something. 

Who thinks it would be awesome if instead of a label popping up on the screen, a small shock is transferred from the mouse to the player's hand?  That would teach those players who do a cursor sweep for labels.  Any ideas of how to implement this feature into AGS are open for discussion. 

[Da_Elf]

oh hook one of those electric devices that you strap to your stomach to "loose weight" to the computer via USB and strap it to your head with neon lights that light up saying "loser"

[InCreator]

Well, I think that's do-able. USB port has small voltage, right? Now you need something to get more amperes out of USB, and there's a device existing (capacitor? converter? can't remember english term for thing, but same stuff that makes tasers work). Or something like this.

All you need is to program your game to send usb signal whenever is the moment and connect yourself to the usb port.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvSuX8o1cKM

There's lots of guides out there but using device that flashes camera seems to be most believable.
zap!

Stupid idea though.

[Akatosh]

Also, how many people use a mouse that's made of metal? 

[Rui 'Trovatore' Pires]

So you're now actively trying to punish the player for being explorative?

EDIT - If instead of shock you mean make the mouse "vibrate", THAT's novel and might be of interest, but then again, it might still be just a gimmick with not much real use.

[Lionmonkey]

You see, different people have different computers, different power systems and different chronical illnesses. And calibrating power of the shock burst, checking all these factors per every user is too difficult. And without precicely calibrating the shock strenght, things can get fatal to the people who play this game.

It's not like I care fo them, but I don't want a game develeper to be put in jail or become a fugitive, since then he/she will get problems with uploading their games.

[CodeJunkie]

The Wii controller vibrates when the cursor is hovering over certain buttons I think.  But anyway, this is impossible with a normal mouse.  You'd have to do a load of soldering and writing drivers and whatnot.  Perhaps you can buy a special shocking mouse, but honestly, unless you are really enthusiastic and know what you're doing there are probably better things you can spend your time and money on.

[Evil]

A long time ago, I saw a thing on TechTV (Back when it was still TechTV, thats how long ago) where they did something similar. It was right when the XBox came out. They took apart a dog shock collar of some sort, and modded a controller and replaced the rumble with a taser to the palm. It worked pretty well, so they said, but I can't imagine using that taser thing all the time. It would get really annoying.

I mean, you could shock people, but they wouldn't want to play if they knew that they would get shocked, yet alone buy a special controller.

[zabnat]

I too remember some people creating their own vibrating mouses and if I'm not mistaken I think I saw somewhere a commercial version of that.

Well, I think that's do-able. USB port has small voltage, right? Now you need something to get more amperes out of USB, and there's a device existing (capacitor? converter? can't remember english term for thing, but same stuff that makes tasers work). Or something like this.

I hope you mean more voltage not amperes. Unless you want to kill somebody. Tasers commonly have tens of thousands volts, but only little current (amps).

[Dualnames]

I don;t think we can actually fix it. Unless we do it my way.. which is this:

if (Hotspot.GetAtScreen(mouse.x,mouse.y)!=null) {
counter++;
}
if (Hotspot.GetAtScreen(mouse.x,mouse.y)==null) {
counter=0;
close gui
return;
}
if (counter==40) {
open gui
}

That means that the label will appear only if the player hovers over it for a certain amount of time. i won;t make this frustrating so don;t bother saying you fascist. i'll just make it kind of clear that observation is better.

It's a cool effect and it willl go unnoticed and stuff.

}

[Andorxor]

If you implement shocking hints i expect that you have a Email program that shocks you whenever you open a mail that complains about pixelhunting in your adventure.

[Radiant]

It also works well against hackers...

[Dualnames]

I actually hate pixelhunting myself so there won;t be any.

[yukonhorror]

Not so much as a punishment, but really it would be even more explicit than a label.